On 5 September, the Roman Catholic Sisters of Mother Theresa (Missionaries of Charity) commemorated the 15th anniversary of the death of Mother Teresa of Calcutta, their foundress, with a Holy Mass. The mass was celebrated by Fr Stephen Buckland SJ, Jesuit Provincial Superior for Zimbabwe, at the sisters’ Home of Love in Ardbennie, just across the road from Mbare where the sisters often find old homeless people.

Many have lost contact with their families, or have been abandoned and cannot look after themselves because of old age, sickness and stark poverty; many are migrant labourers no longer able to work. 

400 children from poor families came to receive food packets, and some adults too. The Missionaries of Charity in Ardbennie are the only community of their congregation in Zimbabwe. Of the five Sisters, four are Indian and one is from Tanzania. Until recently there was one from Kenya, Sr Benita, but she was transferred to be superior in Maputo,Mozambique. There are houses of Mother Theresa’s Sisters also in South Africa (Johannesburg, Durban, Cape Town), Zambia, Malawi, Madagascar. The Sisters are used to moving from one country to another and change languages and cultures. 

They welcome Zimbabwean girls wishing to join their congregation and way of life.